HOST 3.2 Beta 1a: Red error when starbase's are built bug fixed. HOST 3.2 Beta 1c: All ships in free space visible to Informer bug fixed. Super star destroyer always visible bug fixed. Bio scanners will not scan native life on planets with 20 or more defense outposts. Spelling error: "Trader" ----> "Traitor" Spelling error: "Assult" ----> "Assault" Defaults set to: Cloaked Ships May be robbed: NO ATT/NUK : YES Web mine sweep range : 0 ly Mine sweep range : 5 ly Max minefield radius : 150 ly Glory device no longer sends two messages if one of your own ships get hit with the shock wave. SENDMESS.EXE now sends messages from the host to the 3.5 interface. The REAL XYPLAN.DAT file is: XYPLAN DAT 3,000 02-23-93 8:34a The other XYPLAN.DAT file that was sent out with the other beta test host files was not the one and only one that I made. I don't know where in the world it came from. Delete the bogus XYPLAN.DAT that came with the other beta test. HOST 3.2 Beta Test 1d -------------------------------------- Thanks to the help of cfoss@nbnet.nb.ca ( Colin Foss ) Bugs in 3.2 that caused host crashes have been found and fixed. Super Spi ships caused the host to crash when they were successful at changing the planet's friendly code. Chunnel function crashed host if the fire cloud's friendly code was set to a certain friendly code. --------------------------------------- Other fixes and changes: Cobol ram scoop works even if the cobol reaches its waypoint. TYPO Fixed: "on the this planet" ---> "on this planet" TYPO Fixed: "We can have" ---> "We have" Master.exe 3.20a now clears the priority build points. Fixed clone function, it sometimes required one unit too much tech to clone a ship. TYPO FIXED: "A cloaked ship has detected" ---> "A cloaked ship has been detected" BAD GAMMAR FIXED: "Defense outposts using ion discharge" ---> "Defense outposts are using an ion discharge" TYPO FIXED: "magacredits" ---> "megacredits" ADDED: A LOKI will not decloak a cloaked Lizard ship or Fed Ship. ADDED: Hyper jumping ships do not get sucked into planets by warp wells. Error in growth rate fixed, populations grow at a faster rate. (Same as 3.14b) ADDED: Hitting a deep space mine will slow a ship by 10 ly. ADDED: Cloaked ships that hit a mine and go over the damage that prevents cloak limit will come out of cloak. HOST now dumps messages to RACE 12 to a HOSTMESS.TXT file and to HOST.LOG. ADDED: Engine shield bonus is not in effect when a ship is attacking a planet. ---------------------------- HOST 3.2 Beta Test 1e Fixed: The Super Stardestroyer is immune to all NUK / ATT attacking planets if the Imperial Assault mission is turned on. It does not matter which race owns the Super Star Destroyer, it is immune. It is a ship thing, not a race thing. ---------------------------- HOST 3.2 Beta Test 2a Fixed: BUG: "bum" on a planet causes the money to vanish When a planet's friendly code code is set to "bum" and the money on the planet is greater then 32,768 mc the money is not beamed up to the enemy ships in orbit. Negative amounts of money may appear on the ship in orbit instead. FIXED: Bug Number 0007 fixed. Primarily what the bug is involves the score not decrementing when losing a base. Changed: Ion storms now start closer to the edge of the map ---------------------- Size of HOST.EXE reduced from 151,774 bytes to under 143,700 bytes. Speed increase: Speed of HOST 3.2 beta 2a is about 55% faster than HOST 3.2 beta 1d. On an Intel 486DX2-66 8meg of ram Windows 95 Final Beta running HOST.EXE in a small DOS Window (Not full screen): 500 ships 47 starbases 150 to 200 messages per player: HOST 3.2 Beta 1d: 2' 42" HOST 3.2 Beta 2a: 1' 13" Host used 337K of Conventional memory --------------------- HCONFIG ITEMS ADDED: Cobol Fuel Scoop: The amount of fuel that the Cobol Class makes per LY can be changed from the default of 2kt to 0kt 1kt 2kt 3kt or 4kt per light year traveled. This is the amount of fuel that a Cobol class ship will extract from the near-vacuum of space for every light year that the ship travels. Aries Alchemy Switch If yes the Aries class starship will convert minerals into fuel. Bioscanners Switch If yes the Cobol, Pawn and Brynhild class starships are capable of detecting native life on other planets. If the starships mission is sensor sweep this ability will be activated. Mine Hit Tech Slowdown This is the tech level of starship hulls that are not slowed down by a mine hit. Ship hulls at this tech level and above will not be slowed by a mine hit. Ship hulls below this setting will be slowed by 10LY when they hit a space mine. (range 1 to 10 ) default = 7 HCONFIG.EXE now makes a CONFIG.TXT file in the hst data directory that it is configuring when you save. This a text file is a listing of the current config settings being used in the game. Run the new HCONFIG.EXE before you run the new HOST 3.2 Beta 2a and set the last 4 items or else HOST will switch ALL settings to default settings. You should set the last 4 settings to this: Cobol class free fuel per LY 2 KT Aries can convert minerals to fuel YES Bioscanners YES Hull Tech not slowed by mine hits 7 ---------------------------- HOST 3.2 Beta Test 2b Added: Friendly code of minefields now take effect as soon as mines are dropped . Added: Minefield friendly code now prevents web mines from draining ships with matching friendly codes Added: Ship data error check after AUXHOST2.BAT. Fixed: Long waypoints crashing DOS PLANETS.EXE fixed. Changed: The Super Star Destroyer must have 0 damage to do the imperial assault mission. Added: When a cloaked ship is burning fuel to stay cloaked and it does not have enough fuel to remain cloaked the ship will decloak and not burn the cloak burn fuel. Before this fix it was decloaking and burning the cloak burn fuel at the same time. Problem found by: Richard Nadolny ------------------------------------------------------------------- HOST 3.2 Beta Test 3a Fixed: HYP ships burned no fuel if fuel < 50kt and friendly code to "HYP" They now burn fuel. Fixed: Message error causing black lines on version 3.00 PLANETS.EXE client programs, when a message is sent from a WINPLAN.EXE 3.5 client. Rule Changed: Ships on intercept courses now burn the "standard" amount of fuel. I.E. A ship intercepting a ship 3 LY away now burns 3 LY of fuel. Intercepting ships were burning an amount equal the maximum amount that will be burnt at the set warp factor. A ship incepting a ship 3LY away at warp 9 was burning the amount needed to go 81LY. FIXED: Host now uses a random number seed other then TIMER (seconds past midnight) The random number seed is now the sum of the total amount of fuel on all ships plus the race ID of all ships. Spelling error: Captian's >> Captain's NEW: The planet friendly code "dmp" cancels the building of a ship if a ship is not built due to the 500 ship limit. If the ship limit is not reached the ship is built and then the starbase parts are "dumped" ("dmp"). Changed: The planet friendly code "dmp" does not recycle starbase torpedoes into minerals. Changed: Mine sweeping ships do not sweep minefields with a friendly code matching that of the ship. FIXED: No more freighter vs freighter VCRs Changed: Cloaked ships do not attack planets Changed: Warp wells are 3.00 light years in diameter ( prefect circle ) (not a square) Spelling error: Reptain >> Reptilian Spelling error: Riped >> Ripped Host checks to see if messages are coming from the true players and not from a 3rd party hack program that sends fake messages. NEW: You do not sweep enemy mine field that have a friendly code that matches your ship. NEW: Mine hit messages include ship ID numbers of the ship that hit the mine. The Cobol Class (colonial fuel scooper) does not scoop fuel when it is on an intercept mission, being towed and towing. The is >>NOT<< a right/left side ship combat advantage in host 3.2x. Claims of this are a bold face lie. The cloak fail rate is not 50% all the time. The cloak fail rate works as documented. The odds are within a few percentage points of the set rate. The HOST.LOG now will tell you how many cloak fails took place out of how many ships are cloaked. The is more misinformation being spread about HOST. New: Chunnel rules: A ship belonging to a race other than the race of the Firecloud opening a chunnel at the same point in space as the firecloud must have a warp speed of 0 to enter the chunnel (way point setting does not matter). The chunnel ship's race can enter the chunnel at any warp speed. For Example: If fleet of enemy ships that warp onto a planet that is hiding a firecloud with its chunnel engaged only the enemy ships with a warp speed of 0 will enter the chunnel. The only ships that can move onto a planet with a warp speed of 0 are ships that are being towed. None of the ships that moved their under their own will enter the chunnel. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Old rules to remember: A pair Fireclouds can not use a chunnel if ANYSHIP with fuel locks a tow beam on it, the warp speed and waypoint setting of the ship locking the beam does not matter. Minimum range of chunnel: 100 LY Special climate max populations: Rebels: Surface temp 19 and lower Maximum clans that can survive: at least 200 Fascists and Robots: Surface temp 81 and higher Maximum clans that can survive: at least 60 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Maybe A Bug: I have reports of "btt" and "btf" causing ships to exploded. The reported way that this is done is a cloaked ship uses "btt" and "btf" to transfer torps or fighters to unsupecting enemy ships. The torps or fighters explode the next turn. I have spent a whole day testing "btt" and "btf" and have been unable to repeat the bug. I supect it to be caused by bugs in WINPLAN 3.5 Beta 1x's transporters. These bugs have been fixed in WINPLAN 3.5 Beta 2b. If you can figure out anything on this bug please report it at once. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Maybe A Bug: BIO-SCANNERS are reported to not be able to detect life on unowned planets. I tested it and it seems to be working as it should. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Reported Bug: The "gsN" (Give Ship to race N) command is reported to not work. The code requires that the "enemy race" that you are giving the be at the same spot in space with at least clan of colonists. Only registered players can give ships away using "gsN". ------------------------------------------------------------------- Not a bug: The Lady Royale Class Cruiser: False bug reported: "When I beam all the colonists off of a Lady Royale the ship still makes 160mc" You can collect money from a group of colonists on a Lady Royale the same turn that they beam down to an unowned/enemy planet. If 160 colonist clans beam down to a planet that you do not own you will find 0 colonist clans plus 160 megacredits onboard the ship the next turn. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Super refit mystery solved! Problem: Fed superrefit does not work, it removes the ships weapons and leaves it with none. Solution: This happens when you are refitting a ship and you do not have 100% of the beams or torp tubes on the starbase for the refit. E.I. To super refit a Nova Class you need at least 10 beam of any one type on the starbase and at least 10 torp tubes of any one type on the starbase. Normal ship building takes place before the super refit, so if some other ship uses the refiting ship's parts before hand, the super refit will not take place and the ship will be left with no weapons. NOTE: If the Nova has 10 torp tubes and 10 beams before the super refit, it will have the same weapons after if there were not a full set of better parts on the starbase. ------------------------------------------------------------------- NOT A BUG: If a ship that you are towing cloaks you are still towing it. Cloaking does not break a tow. This is not a bug, it is game design. I want players to be able to tow cloaked "enemy" ships into battle or accross a minefield. ------------------------------------------------------------------- NOT A BUG: Having a fixed fuel burn rate is not a bug. It is part of the game design. The ships in VGA Planets burn all their fuel at once to jump to the set warp speed all within a few seconds. Like a gun being fired in a vacuum. The chemical rocket model does not apply to the ships in VGA Planets. These are faster then light star ships in a science fiction game not V2 rockets.